The first outdoor edition of the Great American Beer Festival was held this weekend at Levitt Pavilion in Denver, including the annual awards ceremony.

Three New Mexico breweries won one medal apiece, with another rare occurrence of two breweries winning in the same category. The last time that happened was in 2024 when Tractor took gold and Boxing Bear got silver in the Sweet Stout or Cream Stout category.

This time around, it was Quarter Celtic and Boxing Bear sharing the spotlight in the Munich-Style Dunkel category. Quarter Celtic’s Step Drunkle claimed silver and Boxing Bear’s Black Mesa Dunkel earned bronze.

Quarter Celtic has now won five GABF medals (one gold, three silver, one bronze) in the last seven years.

Boxing Bear has earned six GABF medals (two gold, two silver, two bronze) dating back to 2015.

The third medal this year went to Second Street, which took bronze with Brown Ale in the American Brown Ale category. That beer had previously won gold back in 2020.

Overall, it marks seven medals (two gold, one silver, four bronze) for Second Street dating all the way back to 1997 (six medals have come since 2013). That’s the most of any Santa Fe area brewery.

The Crew will try to catch up to the winners for comment once they get back to New Mexico.

As for the festival itself, the grand outdoor experiment didn’t seem to go over too well Saturday. Not enough bathrooms or water stations, no shaded areas besides the tents for the breweries, and transportation issues seemed to sour the mood (at least as far as online commentary goes). Hopefully things were at least partly ironed out Sunday. It did sell out both days, so maybe with some adjustments it can return in 2027.

And again, if anyone reading this attended GABF, please send us your pictures and your thoughts on how it all turned out.

Keep supporting local!

— Stoutmeister